SAN JOSE, Calif. – It can be difficult to find the right words to sum up a guy known as “Mr. Hockey.”
But to see the way Sidney Crosby spoke about Gordie Howe on Saturday afternoon was to see the avalanche of touching tributes that have followed his death come to life. Here we had the game’s biggest superstar, on the game’s biggest stage, wearing an ear-to-ear grin while discussing his first meeting with Howe.
“When you think of hockey, that’s who you think of,” Crosby said after practice at SAP Center. “The way he played, the way he conducted himself, he’s a role model for a lot of people, including myself. I had the opportunity to meet him and feel pretty fortunate to have done that.”
Their first encounter occurred at Joe Louis Arena not long after Crosby entered the NHL. It happened unexpectedly – without warning – while the Pittsburgh Penguins captain made the long walk around that building to the bus.
“Like anyone else, you don’t even know what to say,” said Crosby. “You just kind of shake his hand, you’re in awe. Just the way he spends time to talk to people – there [were] so many people that wanted to meet him, wanted to take a picture with him – and he just made you feel comfortable.
“He’s just a genuine person.”
There has been an outpouring of anecdotes and adoration since Howe died at the age of 88 on Friday morning. The sheer volume of reaction says a lot about a superstar who had an everyman’s touch.
Crosby was born more than seven years after Howe’s last NHL game and still held him in extremely high esteem.
Jim Rutherford, the Penguins general manager, was fortunate to find himself sharing a dressing room with Howe after making the Red Wings as a 21-year-old rookie in 1970. He recalls feeling Howe’s patented elbow in the ribs before hearing him deliver an unexpected line.
One such occasion came after Rutherford had gone against the team’s wishes and returned home to attend his grandfather’s funeral.
“The organization didn’t want to give me the time off,” Rutherford explained. “I made my own decision that I was going to go. He was the first one there to tell me … he comes from the side or behind, gives you a little elbow: ‘Hey kid, good for you, that’s exactly what you should have done.’
“He was right there to support me.”
While Rutherford spoke glowingly about Howe as a premier player – “I can’t think of anybody in my time over five decades in the league that I could even come close to comparing him to” – it was his humanity that truly set him apart.
“He was a guy that, in some ways, was hard to describe,” said Rutherford. “He just had a special way about him. As a teammate, you looked around the room, and if somebody was struggling with something in his own way he’d go by and say something to them. Might not be long. Might not say, ‘Hey, do you want to go somewhere and talk?’
“He’d walk by and kind of catch you from behind, give you a little poke, a little elbow, say a few words, which meant a lot.”
He left an impression on an entire sport.
Crosby and the Penguins currently find themselves one win away from lifting the Stanley Cup, but they spent more time discussing Howe than anything else on the eve of Game 6 against the San Jose Sharks.
“He was done playing by the time I was even born,” said Crosby. “But I think if you love the game, if you love reading stories about the people who played it, he played with a ton of passion. Played on that edge — you know wasn’t afraid to play physical too.
“I think those are the kind of things you love about a hockey player.”
